Monday, July 9, 2012

Easily the most affecting love-story I have watched in a while, is that of Mal-Cobb.
A love, whose intensity excludes the whole world, which is fraught with
fickle uncertainties. A love that instead builds an infinite and eternal
universe, so as to do justice to the demands of togetherness.

The defining moment in the film pits the wholesome, but elusive,
'reality' of one's lover against a one's perception ('projection' to use
the film's vocabulary) of the lover.

Note: a projection is NOT a comfortable assemblage of attributes from a
wishlist (right mix of traditional and modern, clean habits). It is a much more complex
and earnest representation of all that one has taken the other person to
be. Indeed, it is borne out of the depths of one's understanding of
the other person. So, if a 'projection' is everything one understands
the other to be, then why would it be lesser than what 'is'? Does 'what
is' have a value independent of what one can perceive and understand it
to be?

Sure, it would be selfish to claim otherwise.

But would we really really care? Does it make any difference at all to
us? One can live a lifetime with a 'projection', without understanding
what one has failed to capture. Particularly when perpetuation of
perceptions dominates relationships more than we like to admit. And, as if it were not confusing
enough, people - consciously or otherwise- gradually try and fit into
the impressions that their loved ones have of them.

Can we ever just be? Or are we always apparitions of ourselves for others, particularly, for those we care a lot about: